Dark Immolation

by Christopher Husberg

  Cabral smiled and sat up. “This would be very pleasing to me. We would have taken care of these Nazaniin annoyances long ago if it were not for my status in the city. This could be very beneficial to both of us.”

  At that moment a servant girl came rushing in. She moved quickly to Cabral’s side and whispered in his ear. Cabral’s mouth twisted into the most sinister smile Astrid had seen on him yet.

  “How wonderful. It seems our friend is back from his journey. My dear Astrid, are you ready to see Trave again, after all these years?”

  The blood froze in her veins. Her body was stiff, but inside her head a storm raged. “‘Ready’ is not a word I would use to describe my feelings at the moment,” Astrid replied.

  She turned at the sound of heavy footsteps, and looked up to see Trave stride into the great hall. When she had last seen him he had smiled almost constantly; while he ate, while he fought, while he raped. Now his expression was somber, his scarred face pulled downwards. Astrid remembered the scars, remembered staring up at them in anger and in sadness and in despair and finally in resignation. He wore a gray eyepatch over an empty socket, strapped around his long and unwashed dark-brown hair. While vampires could heal from most wounds very quickly, they couldn’t heal from wounds suffered before they turned, or from the removal of limbs or other body parts when cauterized with fire, as Trave’s eye had been. And, while they could usually recover from burns if they got out of the sun or fire quick enough, sustained damage often left scars. Long exposure meant a vampire would be burned to a useless husk.

  Astrid flexed her left hand. The last time she’d seen Trave, her left hand had been badly burned. It’d taken nearly a decade to become functional again.

  Cabral’s voice boomed across the room. “Welcome, Trave. It has been too long. Your journey was successful, I trust?”

  “Successful enough,” Trave rasped, his voice as rough as Astrid remembered. A sudden resolve filled her. She couldn’t hide from this man. She stood, planting her feet on the seat of her chair, and stared at Trave, back straight, head tall. Their gazes locked. Astrid glared at him defiantly, proudly. Trave’s gaze did not leave hers, but Astrid saw the last emotion she would have ever expected in the man’s eyes. Astrid saw fear.

  Cabral laughed. “I knew this reunion would be too good to miss. Trave, you remember Astrid? And, Astrid, I know you remember Trave.”

  Astrid and Trave stared at one another, but to her surprise, Trave was the first to look away. He swept past Astrid without a word, and took his place at Cabral’s right hand.

  Cabral laughed. “So uncomfortable,” he said, giving a mock shiver. “I’d hate to be either of you in this moment. Such a strange reunion.”

  Trave leaned close to Cabral, whispering something in his ear. Cabral frowned. “No, Trave. Not today. I need you here. In fact, an important task has arisen. The Nazaniin have been making threatening noises for weeks, now. Astrid has kindly offered to help us dispose of the cotir, provided she gets some information from them that she apparently needs… for a friend.”

  Cabral laughed again, another short bark. “Can you believe it, Trave? She says she has friends, now. Who could have predicted such a thing?” He looked at Astrid, his eyes glowing red in the hazy light of the great hall, brighter and brighter as darkness descended outside. “I can trust Trave to be stealthy in his actions. You two will take care of this Nazaniin threat together. You will then report back to me, and we will all be one happy family once more.”

  Cabral laughed again but Astrid felt none of his mirth. Killing a Nazaniin triad was difficult enough. Having to work alongside Trave… it was nigh on impossible.

  28

  Harmoth estate

  KNOT CHEWED HIS CHEEK as he stared at the body, the second laid out in the Harmoth mansion in the last week. The first body had been that of a female assassin; this was a young man, a new Odenite who had only arrived a few days ago. Knot did not know the man’s name. Not that he would recognize him if he did; the man’s face was a bruised, broken mess, and his attackers had branded a cross and crescent into his forehead.

  Cinzia and Jane conversed quietly, their parents Ehram and Pascia by their side. Elessa and Ocrestia, who had also been recently presented as one of Jane’s disciples, stood nearby. Elessa had not yet met Knot’s gaze, and he had made an effort not to look in her direction, either. He did not want to make her any more uncomfortable than she already was.

  “Please, tell us what happened,” Ehram asked. He spoke to a middle-aged woman, who sat in a chair next to the young man’s body. Her eyes were wide and staring outward into nothing. The dead man’s mother. Ehram placed a hand on her shoulder. “I’m sorry to make you go through it,” he said. “But we must know what happened.”

  “We were passing through town,” the woman said, “on our way to see the Prophetess.” The woman’s eyes flickered to Jane. “A group of men approached us. Four, maybe only three. They asked where we were heading, and we told them, we didn’t know any better, we didn’t know what they would do, Canta help us, we didn’t know…” The woman trailed off. Jane moved to her side and put her arm around her. “We told them where we were going, and… and they laughed at us at first. They asked if we were elf-lovers. We did not know what they were talking about. They kept laughing, but then, they… they…”

  The woman’s voice choked into silence, and she reached out to the bed, where her son lay. “They started pushing my son,” she said after a moment. “They started pushing him between them, laughing at him, calling him an elf-lover. And then one of them hit him. Hit him hard, and he fell to the ground. One of them picked him back up, and then they hit him again, and again… Canta rising, they just kept hitting him, and wouldn’t stop. One of them had a medallion, with the cross and crescent, and there was a torch nearby…”

  The men had branded the mother, too. The angry burned flesh stood out on her forehead. Knot couldn’t imagine the pain the woman was feeling—and her brand was likely the least of it.

  He turned and walked out the door, not sure what to say. He knew what that boy had faced; Knot had experienced a taste of that fear and prejudice in Pranna. He was no tiellan, so he could never know exactly what they felt, but he’d been called elf-lover and worse. But he had known how to handle himself. This young man had no such defense.

  Knot leaned against the wall in the corridor, breathing slowly. After a few moments the door opened and the others joined him.

  “Are you all right?” Cinzia asked, her eyes looking up at him with concern.

  Knot eyed Elessa warily. He did not want to frighten her. “Fine,” Knot said. “Just… just trying to handle some emotions.”

  “We all are,” Cinzia said.

  “This is not right,” Jane said.

  “No shit,” Knot muttered.

  “Of course it isn’t right,” Elessa said. “But what can we do about it? We can’t control how they treat us, how they think.”

  “No, Jane is right,” Cinzia said. “Something is off about how we are being treated here. Something is different.”

  “This isn’t normal,” Jane said. “I don’t believe the people of Tinska would act this way of their own accord. To kill an innocent young man? I believe someone, or something, is affecting them.”

  “How do you mean?” Elessa asked. Knot had hardly heard the woman speak since he’d attacked her. Since Lathe had attacked her. But how could she tell the difference?

  “The Nine Daemons are loose in the world,” Cinzia said.

  “Yes,” Jane whispered.

  Cinzia pointed at the window, towards Tinska. “You think one of the Nine Daemons is…” Elessa was nodding; Ocrestia was staring at Jane with dark, smoldering eyes.

  “Is that possible?” Elessa asked. “Could one of them really be… influencing people?”

  Cinzia glanced at Knot. “If what we experienced in Roden is any indication, then yes.”

  “It is more than that,” Jane said. “They are among us.”
>
  Knot slammed his fist against the wall, perhaps with more force than he intended. Each of the women, with the notable exception of Ocrestia, jumped at the sound. Knot regretted it immediately, especially when he saw the way Elessa looked at him. “What in Oblivion are you all talking about?” he demanded.

  “Jane thinks that one of the Nine Daemons is—”

  “I know what you are saying, but what do you mean?”

  Cinzia frowned at him. “You were there in Roden, Knot. You saw what happened—”

  “Of course I saw it,” Knot said, throwing up his hands. “But that doesn’t mean I have the slightest clue what it was, what it meant.”

  “We have already discussed this,” Cinzia said, shaking her head. “That man—that thing—that came through the portal, in Izet, was Azael. One of the Nine Daemons. He ushered in the Rising, allowing the Nine Daemons to once again walk the Sfaera.”

  Jane put a hand on his shoulder. “I understand you have questions,” she said. “We have not been clear in our explanations, and for that I apologize. But we don’t understand everything going on here, either. I’ve made many guesses about what the Rising means, what the Nine Daemons could actually be doing among us. None of them are based on fact.”

  “I just want to know what you know,” Knot said. “I can’t be of much help, otherwise.”

  Jane nodded. “Very well… but I’m afraid it is not much. Azael, the Daemon you encountered in Izet, is one of the Nine Daemons. Their leader, or so the stories say. By gaining entrance to the Sfaera, he opened the door for the other eight. We may not have seen them come through the portal that night… but they are here. They can influence us, certainly, and some of them may have already seized physical forms.” She began moving down the corridor. “Come,” she said. “Let us discuss this somewhere more comfortable.”

  Somewhere more private, Knot translated. He nodded to himself and, with the other three women, began following Jane up the large staircase.

  “And what are they going to do, now that this door is open?” Knot asked.

  “We can’t be sure exactly. But we do know something of their end goal. The Nine Daemons are of a world beyond our understanding. We speak of the Praeclara, where Canta dwells, and where each of us might dwell if we are judged worthy. We speak of Oblivion, the nothingness we will become if we are judged otherwise. And, of course, we currently dwell on the Sfaera. But…we never speak of the other place.”

  Knot grunted. “Always thought Daemons were from Oblivion.”

  “So the Denomination teaches,” Jane said, glancing at Cinzia, “but, as in so many things, they have gone astray in their doctrine.”

  Jane ushered them into a large drawing room. A chaise longue, a couch, and three large stuffed chairs took up the center of the room, while other chairs, made of wood and intricately carved, lined the walls. A huge inglenook fireplace topped by a massive marble mantel slab took up one side of the room.

  “Come in,” Jane said, sitting down in one of the stuffed chairs. “Take a seat. Let us discuss this openly.” Cinzia sat on the chaise longue, while Elessa took the couch. That left an armchair each for Knot and Ocrestia. They glanced at each other, then sat down.

  “So the Nine Daemons are from another world,” Knot said. “But they are not the only ones?”

  “No,” Jane said. “You know the other denizens of their world as Outsiders. I believe Astrid was the one to tell you that term.”

  Knot frowned, remembering what they’d faced in the imperial palace. He could still see their elongated, sinewy bodies, and oversized jaws with rows of dagger-like teeth.

  “Whenever a portal opens to this other world,” Jane said, “some of the Outsiders are inevitably dragged through it.”

  “But we are not dragged to the other side in return?” Knot asked.

  Jane shrugged. “I don’t think so,” she said. “But I can’t be sure.”

  “No one was dragged back in Izet,” Knot said. “Not that we could see, anyway.”

  “And that is the only portal we know of,” Jane said. “But, as I said, the other Daemons should have access to this world, now. Whether they have arrived in full form is yet to be seen. I’m not even sure Azael remained here physically.”

  “But you think one of them is in Tinska?” Knot asked.

  Jane nodded. “I do. It is the only explanation I can think of as to why the people are acting this way. The Daemons would likely be able to sense where we are. Where I am. It would make sense they would send one of their own here… to me.”

  “You mentioned their end goal, but you never elaborated,” Knot said. “What are the Nine Daemons here to do?”

  Jane sighed. “It is simple, and yet it is not. The easiest thing to say would be this: they are here to destroy us. They are here to destroy our world, our people, everything we know.”

  “But there is more to it than that,” Knot said.

  Jane nodded. “There is always more to it than that… but the truth is, we know very little of them, or what they want.”

  Knot snorted, unable to help himself. “For all we know the Outsiders are perfectly agreeable folk? We just have no way to communicate with them, to understand what they want?”

  Jane shook her head. “No,” she said. “Surely your experience with Azael and the Outsiders in Izet has taught you more than that, Knot. Can you truly imagine they are agreeable? Can you imagine living in harmony with the embodiment of fear itself?”

  He had to admit that he couldn’t. Those things had driven Winter to overdose; they had ultimately killed her. The final Outsider that had emerged from the portal had been larger than any living thing Knot had ever seen, nearly as tall as the imperial dome itself. And the beast had displayed nothing but animosity and feral instinct. Nothing civilized at all.

  The Daemon, Azael, was far worse.

  “This is all well and good,” Elessa said in a tone of voice that made Knot suspect it was anything but. “What are we going to do about Jane’s suspicions? What about this Daemon that might be in Tinska?”

  “Shouldn’t we find out if the suspicion is even correct, first?” Ocrestia said.

  Jane nodded. “Of course. Something is causing this change in Tinska’s population; we need to discover whether it is one of the Nine Daemons or something else entirely.”

  “How do we even begin to go about it?” Elessa asked.

  “Or,” Cinzia added, “if it isn’t a Daemon, what could it be? We have a responsibility—”

  “Stop.” All eyes turned to Ocrestia, who was now standing. “Do you even hear yourselves? Are you really that ignorant?”

  “Ocrestia…” Cinzia reached for Ocrestia’s hand, but the tiellan wrenched it away.

  “Do you think what’s been happening to the tiellans in the camp is supernatural? You truly think that humans couldn’t be capable of treating us this way?”

  “But they aren’t just doing it to tiellans anymore,” Elessa said. “That man down there was a human. They called him an elf-lover.”

  “That’s true,” Cinzia said. “When Jane and I were in Tinska the other day, we—”

  Ocrestia laughed. “Do you even hear yourselves? The fact that humans are now involved in the violence is proof it’s supernatural? Because, Canta forbid humans are ever violent against other humans. You think this is so shocking, but I know better. What happened to that boy happened to the men in my town all the time. The Kamite order has been around for centuries. Women I knew were raped by Kamites, by human men, just because they were tiellan. Terrible tragedies, but never surprising. And you shouldn’t be surprised, now. This violence is not new. You’ve just been ignorant of it.”

  Ocrestia sighed. “I ain’t saying that you’re wrong, Jane,” she said. “Might be a Daemon pulling strings in Tinska. But don’t forget the violence that’s been waged against my people for centuries. Don’t blame it on some Daemon without real proof.”

  When Ocrestia sat down, she seemed very small. For a moment, the wom
an’s slight figure and pointed ears reminded Knot of Winter. He saw her curled up on the chair. But Ocrestia’s pale, silvery hair was very different from Winter’s raven black, and while her eyes were dark, they were nowhere near Winter’s twin midnight pools.

  “Goddess, Ocrestia, you’re right,” Jane whispered. “Whether a Daemon is manipulating people in Tinska or not, the fact remains that humans have chosen to act. It was wrong of us not to acknowledge that.”

  Both Cinzia and Elessa whispered their own apologies. Ocrestia shrugged, sitting back in her chair. She glanced at Knot, who nodded to her. She nodded back.

  “We have work to do then,” Cinzia said. “A great deal, it would seem.”

  They stayed up talking through the night, and, listening to the women’s plans, Knot felt hope for the first time in many days.

  29

  Turandel

  ASTRID WAITED.

  Trave had agreed to meet her in a narrow alley. It was dark, although a few hours short of midnight, and Astrid looked down at the alley as she clung to the frame of a window, her toes curled around the sill.

  The conversation with Trave after her reunion with Cabral a few days before had been awkward. She had expected Trave to still be furious with her, but he had not seemed so at all—which only made Astrid more suspicious. Trave’s emotions were dangerous, but he usually wore them openly. She didn’t like that she couldn’t read him. She was still baffled by the fear she had seen in his eye, like seeing a dog walk around on two legs.

  Which was why Astrid was hiding above the alley. She was not about to throw herself into Trave’s company without first assessing the situation.

  When Trave finally appeared, his eye illuminated the alley ahead of him like a crimson torch. He was alone. That did not necessarily make the situation better, but at least she knew her odds. At this point she was relying on Trave’s fear of Cabral to keep him in line, to keep him from betraying her, from… doing anything to her, really. She and Trave had a job to complete, and Trave would, she hoped, put off his revenge until it was finished. Then, Astrid feared, she might have a problem.